


Even as we curse monsters, we admire them, seek to become them, in some ways

by Tobi_Black



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Monsters Walk Among Us, Aperitif, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Hannibal Lecter is a Cannibal, Morally Ambiguous Hannibal Lecter, Morally Grey Will Graham, Pre-Slash, Will Graham-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22042417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tobi_Black/pseuds/Tobi_Black
Summary: Will knew not all monsters looked monstrous, and not all monsters were of man. Dr. Lecter was a perfect example of that, of when the line between monster and man blurs and all who look are fooled.But Will also knew that he, himself, was a perfect example of what happened when morals and laws didn't always align on the same side.An AU take of Episode 1.01 Aperitif where Will is morally grey and Hannibal isn't quite as human as he looks.
Relationships: Alana Bloom & Hannibal Lecter, Alana Bloom & Will Graham, Garrett Jacob Hobbs & Hannibal Lecter, Jack Crawford & Will Graham, Will Graham & Abigail Hobbs, Will Graham & Garrett Jacob Hobbs, Will Graham & Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham & Louise Hobbs
Comments: 5
Kudos: 30





	Even as we curse monsters, we admire them, seek to become them, in some ways

**Author's Note:**

> Credit for the quote in the title - Jim Butcher, Ghost Story; Dresden Files #13
> 
> I'm just playing in someone else's sandbox, and (obviously) don't own Hannibal.

For as long as humanity could remember, it had never been alone.

No, it had never been alone in its entire existence, always walking along with another.

Humanity liked to think it was top of the food chain, but deep down, it knew it wasn’t, even if it tried to deny the existence of those that were. The true honor of top of the food chain, undisputed, was reserved for the Others.

No one was like the other, but they were undeniably _not_ human. Not in morals, not in mind, not in body; they were as divorced from man as reptile was from mammal.

The only thing was – unless they wished it, they looked just like any other man; the perfect ambush predator.

Will wasn’t like others though, if he _looked_ at someone, it didn’t matter how well they hid – he _saw_. He saw if they were human or Other, saw if they were killer or prey, saw everything they’d hide.

As such, it wasn’t the first time he’d _seen_ Hannibal Lecter when Jack had led him into the room, both to consult and to be consulted on.

No, not the first time. Not at all.

The first time was as he’d been walking with Alana and _he’d_ been waiting outside her office, and before they could be introduced, he’d _seen_ how very _not_ human Lecter was. He’d seen him for the wolf in sheep’s skin that he was, and he’d fled before he’d seen any more than _Other_.

(The first time was not long after he’d moved into Baltimore, when he’d been finding his footing after leaving Louisiana and before he’d applied to the FBI. When he’d stumbled across a body displayed like a piece of art in an alley, the head and arms of another coming out of the belly of the first.

In the moments it took to process what he was seeing and pull out his phone to report the body, he’d seen _skilled, trained, sadist –_ seen _run little piggy, I’ll eat you up too_.

He’d looked away then too.)

Cornered and with Jack not _seeing_ what was in the room with them – how could he _not_ see how _danger_ rolled off Lecter – he’d snapped and snarled.

(My what big teeth you have.

My what big eyes you have.

My what large claws you have.)

Hoping that he made it clear that he wouldn’t go quietly into the night.

(Don’t forget to chew me up or I’ll cut myself free from your belly.)

It’d worked before, in scaring off Others from him, after they deemed him too much of a fight to lure in when he wouldn’t be; when he would be too suspicious to fall for any of their _tricks_.

Lecter had just smiled, looking amused.

His eyes had narrowed at the look, focusing not on the Other’s eyes – eyes that would show him too much and would give too much away from himself all at once – but on his teeth.

Like most Others, they weren’t flat. If just glimpsed or held behind curving lips, they’d pass just like any other man’s, but when lips peeled back, they couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than rows of sharp predator’s teeth.

Teeth that had flashed in answer to his challenge, clearly demonstrating that if it was a fight that he wanted, Lecter would take his pound of flesh as easily as breathing from him in payment.

Jack shifted in the seat he’d just taken after escorting Will back to his office. Lecter had been waiting there as if per arranged, casually sitting in one chair as he looked at the map with blue pins and pictures of eight girls. Will saw how Jack watched them stare off, glancing between him then the Other, obviously not entirely sure if this was the result that he’d wanted when he’d introduced Lecter to Will. But Will wasn’t retreating away like he had done to most everyone else that he’d met through Jack and to Jack’s eyes, was showing more interest in, than any other, so didn’t intend to stop them despite how Will wished he would.

Will fidgeted after a moment, glasses shifting down his nose so the band blocked direct eye contact but still gave off the impression that he was trying to, his gaze really on how Lecter’s lips were quirked up over teeth that he knew could easily tear out his throat if the man just leaned forward and bridged the gap between their chairs.

Despite how normally, with two people in the room, as long as he glanced from speaker to speaker, Jack didn’t always notice the complete lack of eye contact and left him alone about it, Will didn’t dare take his eyes off Lecter.

He wasn’t fooled by the sheep skin draped over Lecter’s shoulders, nor how he was dressed in his grandmother’s clothes adjusting her glasses just acting – just claiming it had been too long since he’d seen her; he wasn’t fooled by the predator sitting in the room.

The man just leaned back faintly into his seat, looking amused with his behavior, before he turned his body slightly towards Jack to include him in, “Tell me, how many confessions have you gotten?”

Jack sighed, bowing his hands over his hands for a long moment, not seeing how Will stiffened more and more the longer he was in the room with a predator that seemed to be slipping right past anyone else’s radar.

“Twelve dozen last time I checked. None of them knew details. Until this morning. Then everyone knew details. Some genius in Duluth PD took a picture of Elise Nichols’ body with their phone and shared it with a few close friends. Freddy Lounds ran it on Tattlecrime.com.”

Will couldn’t help the curl of his lip, _meaning_ the feelings behind the word that came out of his mouth – “Tasteless.” – but the _reaction_ didn’t feel like his. He’d picked it up somewhere from someone, and a side glance back towards Lecter after a second away let him see how his lips had thinned minutely, letting him see the Others’ disdain for just a moment before it smoothed out.

That second was enough for him to know the reaction had come from _him_ , and it unnerved him how easy he’d slipped into his suit, even despite being Other.

Then Lecter’s face was placid, blank, as he glanced to him with just a hint of curiosity coloring his tone, “Do you have trouble with taste?”

The lip curl this time was entirely his own, bristling at the _curiosity_ , even as he read the faint unintentional emphasis on taste – on _food_ – that said _food, the act of eating and enjoying what he ate, was important to him, down to his very bones_ , “My thoughts are often not . . tasty.”

The slow blink he got for his phrasing made it clear that he’d understood that Will had meant _savory_ , but had refused to lead the conversation down any path brought to light by words like that, and so had demurred. Then Lecter’s lip quirked, “Nor mine. No effective barriers.”

Will immediately doubted the second statement. Just a glance over the man told him everything he needed to know about how the man lived a life with not a hair out of place, everything having its time and routine. Lecter probably used one of those fancy psych tricks – a Mind Palace – and that it was as grand as Versailles, if he had to hazard a guess, because the idea of losing control for even a moment was so abhorrent.

The fine press of those tailored suits, every pinstripe just so to both accent that he was in shape but not flaunt _how_ in shape, keeping the illusion no matter how he moved reaffirmed it.

“I make forts.”

He’d tried a Mind Palace but windows had gotten broken and rooms trashed before monsters rampaged from one end to the other, and he still didn’t know if he’d intentionally let the memory of his tenth birthday escape him or if it had just gotten so twined with having to fish out bodies from the bayou that he never stopped to think if he was man or child on the dock.

“Associations come quickly.”

The way he’d phrased that set him on edge, “So do forts.” Filling his tone with as much _back off_ as he could without directly insulting Jack’s guest by telling him to fuck off or change the subject. Something – something to do with the suit he’d accidentally taken on in the man’s presence and had rapidly tried to shed as soon as he’d realized it – said that if he was _rude_ , he’d regret it. The fact that Jack was less brusque and _loud_ in everything he _was_ said that he could sense it too, even if he didn’t seem to consciously know it.

The man’s smile broadened, still hardly more than a twist of his lips but his amusement came through loud and clear at his attitude.

“Not fond of eye contact, are you?”

Will didn’t let that goad him into meeting the man’s gaze, keeping his own firmly on his teeth as he flashed the flat edges of his own because that was less of a subject change as it was trying a different angle on a very psychoanalytical question track, and less than subtly too.

“Eyes are distracting. You see too much. You don’t see enough. And it’s hard to focus when you’re thinking, those whites are really white – or they must have hepatitis – or is that a burst vein? So, I try to avoid eyes whenever possible.”

Lecter leaned in a bit, gaze sharpening with a flicker of _interest_ settling in the crinkling corners of his eyes, finding _him_ just as much something that was _curious_ as he was _amusing_ , “I imagine what you see and learn touches everything else in your mind. Your values and decency are present yet shocked at the associations, appalled at your dreams. No forts in the bone arena of your skull for things you love.”

For the sake of the case he’d come in to consult for, he’d unhappily let the psychoanalytical comments slide, intending to leave and never see the man again – and uncaring of what the man thought as long as he never ended up a suspect to a crime that Jack was investigating – but now Lecter was being blatant.

Too blatant. If the Other wanted to play this game – and be damned _amused_ at him for it too, well, he’d _give_ him something to laugh about, maybe that would burn his curiosity to shreds when he refused to march to his tune – he showed all of his teeth in a sneer, refusing to acknowledge how _true_ everything he’d said had felt but just as determined to not give him the satisfaction of knowing how close to home he’d hit.

“What is it, _Doctor_ Lecter? Are you here to consult on his case? Or are you here to consult on _me_? Whose profile are you working on?” Meeting Jack’s eyes for just a second to express the full measure of his _displeasure_ at this set-up, the false pretenses that he’d been dragged away from his office for, after spending weeks being harassed and taken unhappily to crime scenes to be the man’s golden goose, “Whose profile is he working on?”

The Other’s face did a thing where it looked like it was contrite for stepping over his boundaries, but he wasn’t _really_ sorry, Will _knew_ it down to the marrow of his bones. After all, why would the wolf apologize to the pig for blowing their house down, or eating its brother?

“I’m sorry, Will. Observing is what we do. I can’t shut mine off any more than you shut yours off.”

His eyes narrowed on the teeth that he could _just_ catch a glimpse of, nearly _see_ the sharp edges of as lips moved in speech; not taken in by the words.

The man wanted to play this game still, then fine – he could learn for himself how he’d made two different therapists cry and quit after just one session because they’d thought they could look in his head and not have him look back – he could don _his_ suit for a moment.

He shifted in his seat, a mirror of Lecter, back straight and legs casually crossed, straightening his clothes and carrying himself like he was in a suit that cost more than what he made in a year, eyes meeting his for the first time with a sheathed threat, lips curling up in a placid smile that was toothy to its core, “Please don’t psychoanalyze me. You won’t like me when I’m psychoanalyzed. Jack might want you to analyze me. But don’t.”

Will saw how what should have been a trill of alarm was _intrigue_ , at how the man shifted and watched how he instinctively mirrored him while in this suit, recognizing it as a motion of testing and unwilling to give in to the poking and prodding. Only, he panicked at how he’d gazed into this abyss and the abyss hadn’t just gazed back – it was reaching out-

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to give a lecture on psychoanalyzing.”

He shed the suit and walked backwards to the door without turning away, quickly leaving before either man could respond.

~

The last time he’d seen Lecter, it had taken Will _hours_ to shake off that sense of Other that had followed him home. The whole mess had left his dogs anxious, scraping across the ground on their bellies with throats thrown back to him, and he remembered the stories that some Others rubbed animals the wrong way, as they always knew the predator in the room no matter how well they hid.

Of course, some Others were right at home amongst predators and no one knew until they were ripping out your throat.

He’d barely scratched the surface of Lecter but he had still gotten a good enough grasp that the dogs had _known_ that a predator who wouldn’t hesitate to snap their necks and tear their ribcages open to eat their still beating hearts was walking among them. They’d also known it was _him_ , their Alpha, so they’d trusted him enough to not flee in fear but they’d still begged for their lives.

He’d done his best to forget how that had made him feel.

(It had felt powerful, intoxicating. It had been _right_.)

(If only it had again been a _man_ , not his dogs, begging for his life.)

His dogs should never fear _him_ ; they were all _good_ and deserved to never think that he could harm them just as easily as he could love them.

This time was _worse_.

He’d gone to his lecture, and he had stood behind his podium as he’d talked at his students, but it was like his voice had become liquid gold as they’d stared entranced, hyper-focused on him in a way they had never been before. It had been a fight to slouch and keep his gaze down or solely on his powerpoint, when enough of Lecter’s suit had clung to him to make him want to straighten his posture – it was _rude_ to intentionally slouch – before he finished and dismissed the class without letting them ask questions, all but running away as he collected their papers, haphazardly stuffing it all in his bag before rushing out of Quantico.

Maybe it would have been fine, if just as he was turning into his driveway, he hadn’t gotten a call from Jack to come out to a crime scene – ignoring how he had to book a last minute flight out to Minnesota to get there, which would thankfully be reimbursed after he’d pressed about not having the funds to willy-nilly go flying out-of-state last minute nor to pay for the dog-sitting he had to arrange on the way to the airport last minute. Because it wasn’t good enough that he was to act at his beck-and-call for the local area, now he had to go flying out to see this crime scene in _person_ when he could do what he did just as well through photos.

Maybe it would have been fine, so many hours later, if it had been a different crime scene.

But it wasn’t, and it _really_ wasn’t.

His breathe had escaped him in a rush as he’d taken in the girl posed on a rack of antlers, a murder of crows settled around her like dinner guests to a great long table. He’d known in an instant that this wasn’t the same killer as the other girls despite how it looked so much alike.

The cannibal had loved the girls, had eaten them as to always carry a part of them within him.

This killer just thought of his victims as pigs, and that it was an honor that he was elevating them far beyond what they could achieve in life into a piece of art with this piece of field Kabuki.

( _run little piggy, before I eat you too_ )

Even as he said this sort of sadistic intelligent psychopath likely never would be caught in part because they’d never know when they struck again, he’d known he’d seen this work before.

Not just once, but several times – thinking of crime scenes that he’d never been to but visited in photos that had been thought just strange killings worthy of being a case study that came up in his classes, some of which he’d always thought to be connected even if there had been nothing that had connected them other than whispers in the night, shadows in the dark – all with very different types of victims, in many different ways, across several decades, in many different places crossing state and country lines. Particularly as the last time he’d seen this killer’s work was around Baltimore, and they were currently outside Minneapolis, and the only definitive thing in common was that pieces of the victims were missing from both crime scenes and were staged.

Like a spider spinning its web and having its silk just barely be seen when it glittered tauntingly in beams of low light, things stood out that he couldn’t quite put his finger on before the thought was gone on the wind.

( _run little piggy, before I_ ** _eat_** _you too_ )

The words tumbled out of his mouth like bracken water before he even realized what he was saying as he made to leave, while crossing under the police tape.

“Have Dr. Lecter work up a psychological profile. You seem to be impressed with his opinion.”

Particularly considering that it was clear that in Jack seeking the man out, his own opinion was just a useful trick that would be second-guessed and doubted until verified by someone who wasn’t considered more than halfway mad by most.

~

Normally, Will couldn’t get murders out of his head, and they haunted him in his every hour to the point that he’d gotten used to ignoring certain things.

It wouldn’t do to admit that he’d long ago picked up a killer’s habits of knowing every entry and exit, of absently noting what would be needed to disable anyone near him, and that if he let his mind wander – little thoughts like _hm, it wouldn’t be difficult to hoist her up from there to hang_ or _it’d take just a moment to peel out that piece of broken tile and have it in hand at the ready_ slipped past his guard.

Only, it wasn’t Cassie that dodged his steps, leaving him thinking about how much force would have been required to set her on that rack of antlers and what the order of seating would have been for that murder.

It was the Other, Lecter.

Every Other was drastically different from the next or previous, but they all held a few things in common. One was that all those stories, fairy tales and myths alike, had a grain of truth and were full of warnings and lessons about how to survive against an Other.

Never give out your name for nothing.

Bargains could be struck, wishes could be granted, but the price was often steep and exact and cruel, often in blood and pain and sacrifice.

Outsmarting the trick might leave you alive, but beware, escaping death even by the skin of your teeth leaves you a curiosity and liable for repeated run-ins until you inevitably fall to their games.

There are rules to the games, no matter how arbitrary they may seem, and minding your manners might make all the difference in how long you last.

Of course, the best piece of advice was to never cross paths with one, or failing that, act uninteresting.

Will was never so lucky as to be able to heed the first piece of advice, but he’d managed the second until recently. It was typical of his shitty luck that he’d get the attention of the Other that was supposed to get inside his head within moments of meeting him.

It didn’t matter that the Other was back in Maryland, Will could _feel_ the focus that man had turned his way. It felt like a brand on his chest, a collar around his neck, with a leash slack but not loose in the grip of another leading back to him.

As his eyes shut against his will, brought down by the over-the-counter drugs he’d taken so he got _some_ sleep – instead of just fits and spurts that evened out to an hour or two total but never long enough consecutively to be deep enough as to be restful before he woke up for good at two or three in the morning and was up for good for good or ill – he felt breathe on his nape as feathers tickled his back and he glimpsed cloven hoofs settled beside him on his pillow.

Then between one blink and the next, he was no longer looking at the motel wall but looking up at the sky outside his home, considering the stars.

Orion was overhead, his loyal hound at his side.

It was eerie silent, the sound of the river in the distance a non-noise that he _knew_ should have been there but wasn’t registering currently, but the forest around him was the quiet of when a predator was noticed to be on the prowl. It made his skin prickle with unease, going still in case he had another run-in with a bobcat after his catch that he would again let it take.

Then there was a subtle crunching of grass and he glanced to the side to see a feathered stag walking quietly through the meadow towards him.

He spent a long moment observing the glimmering onyx feathers set against ash-blonde fur, the huge rack of obsidian antlers, aware that he was being observed in turn as the stag stopped in its tracks and watched him with dark eyes.

Will was just peering closer, unable to make out the color of its eyes but knowing that it wasn’t a simple mundane color, though exactly what color escaped him at the moment, when a sudden _knock-knock-knock_ startled them both.

The stag bolted as he fell backwards, the world twisting and distorting around him as he fell down and down through a door, and he gasped awake in the bed, slick with sweat, alone.

Even as the knocking came again, he blinked up at the ceiling for a long moment, sluggish mind already knowing it wasn’t Jack at his door but coming up blank at who else it could be. His eyes tracked across the room even as he pulled the sweat-heavy bedsheets off of him, to the clock, taking a moment more to register that it was seven-something in the morning and he’d slept for nearly six hours straight this time.

Then the knocking came again, clearly not deterred by his lack of response, so he shuffled to the door, rubbing the sleep from his eyes at he opened it, grumpy sleep-deprived glare already settled on his face. Fully intending to give a piece of his mind to whoever was on the other side so scathing they wouldn’t notice him standing there in his boxers.

“Good morning, Will. May I come in?”

Will just stared at him, not processing why he was seeing – and hearing – Lecter on his hotel doorstep.

The fact that he was in a three-piece suit was not a surprise, even considering their short acquaintance.

Hallucination or not, he did not move away from the doorway so that the Other could come in, making a point of looking around behind him, “Where’s Crawford?”

Lecter just looked amused at his suspicion, “Deposed in court. The adventure will be yours and mine today.” – particularly as his eyes just narrowed a bit on the bridge of Lecter’s nose even as his body shifted a little with the urge to leave the door to check his phone for any such messages saying as much – “May I come in?”

He didn’t move though, hesitant to give permission even as he eyed how he was holding two cups, a thermos and a small thermal food storage bag.

Whispering in his ear was the old tales about how once you gave permission to an _old one_ it was hard to retract, no matter what sort of permission the original instance was, as it quickly extended to all parts of your life. In for a penny, in for a pound; give an inch, take a mile.

Like he could see where his thoughts had gone, Lecter’s eyes crinkled at the corners with his growing amusement, “May I come into this specific hotel room for a short conversation _before_ the food I brought as a gift gets cold, Will?”

He didn’t really much want to, but if he hesitated for much longer, it would be _rude_ – which he _knew_ was _bad_ when it came to this specific Other already – and as he couldn’t remember how to refuse a _gift_ without insulting the gift-giver considering how rarely he was the subject of a gift, so he shifted out of the doorframe enough for Lecter to come inside.

Despite the fact this was a hotel room, one that he’d checked into very late at night and had spent literally all of his time just sleeping in so the only mess he’d made was of the bed, his overnight bag slung into a chair, it still rankled how shabby the whole place looked, how it made _him_ look shabby and cheap when it was the backdrop for someone with a suit easily worth so much more than _he_ could afford. Lecter didn’t even look at him so the Other didn’t see the bristling that the thought caused him as he made a b-line for the little table by the window and started adjusting the place setting.

For a moment, Will just stood there watching, but the Other paid him no mind as he poured coffee from the thermos into both cups.

He wanted to change into something not reeking of sweat but hesitated to leave Lecter alone with something that he wanted him to eat and drink, but ultimately considered the thought foolish considering _Lecter had brought the food_ ; if the Other intended to do something to the food and drink, he’d already had ample time to do so. Throwing the man another wary look even as he dug around in his bag for a fresh shirt, tempted to get properly dressed just to make the Other wait since it would be rude to start eating without him, but as that would mean taking a shower – which meant having the Other just sit in this room listening to him take a shower – he pulled on yesterday’s pants over his boxers and switched shirts.

Lecter peeled the lids off the Tupperware just as he took the seat opposite him, to show off that inside each was an egg scramble with peppers and onions and slices of meat. Without prompting the man explained as Will tried to ignore how his mouth watered at the _smell_ , “I’m very careful about what I put into my body. Which means I end up preparing most meals myself.” – Lecter’s lips quirking up faintly when Will’s stomach growled loudly in the quiet, and he colored with an embarrassed flush before scowling at the Other’s _continued_ amusement over him – “A little protein scramble to start the day. Some eggs, some sausage, some vegetables.”

He picked up just a dainty piece to pop into his mouth when Will hesitated to eat even after he’d picked up the fork, then pretended to devote all of his attention to slowly demolishing his portion until Will had caved to his hunger and ate a bite. Pretended to ignore how sharply Will inhaled, making a quiet noise of pleasure because it was _good_ , maybe some of the best that he’d ever had, but Will still saw how there was a subtle preening even before he grudgingly said, “It’s delicious. Thank you.”

“My pleasure.”

Will dug in, returning the favor of pretending by pointedly not noticing how Lecter seemed amused by how he chased every piece of the scramble down with his fork.

“I would apologize for my analytical ambush but I know I will soon be apologizing again and you’ll tire of that eventually so I have to consider using apologies sparingly.”

Will lifted his head to eye with a flat gaze directed to Lecter’s cheek for a pointed moment, then made a small gesture to encompass him in this room, meaning how Lecter had up and left Baltimore at what must have been early this morning at an ungodly hour to be here now, probably after Jack called at said ungodly hour to invite him for a second attempt to pick his brain, then had come _here_ to his hotel room; which made _ambush_ a particularly apt word. He’d even acknowledged it, so he knew exactly what he’d done – and while he was saying that he would say sorry but didn’t want to diminish the word considering he imagined he’d be saying it a lot in the future – he wasn’t actually sorry he’d done so.

Because Will had gone and captured his interest and while he may have fled once – twice – (thrice) - it wasn’t a tactic that would work here nor work forever, as they were both aware.

Will would have to do his best to curb that interest however he could before he was devoured.

“Just keep it professional, Doctor Lecter.”

The Other paused with a bite halfway to his mouth, before lowering it for a second to say, “Or we could socialize like adults instead. God forbid we become friendly, because I imagine we’ll be seeing a lot of each other until Jack is satisfied you are as fine as you claim.”

Unspoken was how Will didn’t have much choice there while Lecter basically had free rein to come back again and again until Jack sent him away for good, and unless he crossed a line – which Will knew he wouldn’t, he’d probably drawn more of those lines than he’d admit to and knew exactly how to toe them – Will wouldn’t be able to get rid of him. Lecter was suggesting that they could play this the hard way or the easy way.

Will could have laughed; he’d never taken the easy way in his life, and he doubted that he would start now, while the worst Lecter could do without any cooperation from him was pull him out of the field, and considering Jack had dragged him mildly unwillingly out of his classroom to start with, that was _fine_ with him.

He’d been waiting for the stick to show itself considering Lecter had been dangling a carrot so far during this whole encounter, and now it had.

He took another bite of the scramble, nearly done with it and trying to savor the last few bites.

He was a fisherman, he had the patience to wait out in the cold for hours until a fish bit at his lure, he could outwait someone who’d only seen him react and found those reactions interesting.

“I don’t find you that interesting.”

Lecter smiled without smiling.

“You will.”

Then he ate another bite, and let the subject drop for now, to why he’d been asked to come to Will, “Agent Crawford tells me you have a knack for the monsters.”

Will put down his fork for the moment, not sure if Lecter was talking about those like himself or the more human variety, or the fact that he had a reputation for finding and catching both in certain circles. He imagined that Lecter had heard about it from both sides, and even if he’d been curious before, it was nothing to the intrigue dripping off every line of Lecter turned towards him now.

Like the fact that he could see him – _knew_ that whatever sort of Other he was, it wasn’t the harmless sort and that he very definitely fell into that category of ‘monster’ he had a knack for sniffing out – it wasn’t deterring Lecter in the slightest. Was even reeling him in a bit.

Absently, Will wondered what sort of lure had attracted Lecter but it would be a dangerous game for him to play around to see what variables attracted Lecter’s attention just so he could remove them. Or he could still play that dangerous game and lure him in close enough to really see what sort of monster was beneath his suit so he could out him to Jack to get rid of him through official channels.

Any which route he took would be dangerous though, considering what was interested in him and the track record of someone surviving an Other’s _interest_.

“I called your good friend Dr. Bloom about you. She wouldn’t gossip, not a word. She’s very protective of you. Smitten, I would say. She asked me to keep an eye on you.”

Will almost looked Lecter in the eye as he studied the Other for a long second, barely evading the subtle body shifts that nearly let their gazes match as if Lecter was _daring_ him to gaze back into his abyss; to _see_ him.

If that was what Lecter wanted – Will had absolutely no intention of doing that, just for the petty pleasure of denying the Other what he wanted. He doubted that would be enough to make the Other see how unwilling he was to play any game with him though.

Alana was a good person though, if she looked at Lecter – and Will knew she didn’t see him as the Other he was – and held her tongue, it was because she knew how any psychiatrist that heard of him wanted even just one session with him so that they could pick his brain apart, and it didn’t matter how refined he played off as, she had been able to tell that Lecter wanted the same thing as all the rest. She’d promised him in the beginning of their acquaintance that anything she thought of him in a professional capacity, would only be released post-mortem, and as she’d kept that promise, he hadn’t run her off. He could appreciate that she refused to share anything with anyone beyond what was absolutely necessary to keep his privacy.

It was just his luck though that he was pretty sure that Jack had approached her to see if he was fit to do what he was asking, and she’d refused in part because it would be a conflict of interest for her, which was why Lecter had met him in the first place. Considering that he was pretty sure that Alana had mentioned that Lecter had mentored her previously, and even if she had been unwilling to talk about him to another, she had still trusted him enough to give Lecter the _opportunity_ to meet him in an official capacity in lieu of herself – even asked him _to keep an eye on him_.

This is what he gets for not outing every Other he sees; stuck between a rock and a hard place, trying to be the immovable object to Lecter’s unstoppable force.

At the least, if he could not stop this, he could at least guide the current of this conversation away from _him_ – back towards business.

“I don’t think the Shrike killed that girl in the field.”

Maybe if he’d been anyone else – maybe if the Other wasn’t wanting him to _see_ him, in all of his inhuman glory – maybe he wouldn’t seen the very subtle shift in how Lecter held himself at that statement.

Just because he _saw_ didn’t mean that he understood what that subtlety quite was; it was _proud_ , but proud of what? Of whom? Proud that he thought such a thing? Could tell one killer from another when it was so obvious to him but so oblique to others? Proud of it being seen? Will didn’t know specifics or details, but the pride was undeniable.

“The devil is in the details. What didn’t your Copy Cat do to the girl in the field? What gave it away?”

Something about how Lecter phrased those questions, while innocuous, and meant in the end _how could you tell_ , sounded off in tone – in his curiosity. The faintest emphasis on _what gave it away_. Distantly, Will thought he should be very suspicious of it, when it came from a Other that he knew was likely a killer, but there was no judgement.

There was always judgement when he pointed out things like this, when even as they noted down every detail that he pointed out, and used it, they thought that he was messed up in the head to be able to get into the heads of killers as messed up as the ones they begged his help for. There was _always_ judgement in what he said, how he said it, every word and action that left him, no matter how it was phrased.

It was why Lecter was here after all; Jack had judged him unstable, unfit, but was unwilling to cut him loose until he was forced to.

Copy cats caused some of the worst judgement turned his way when everything was so close to the original that he had to push to get it even a possibility to be considered. No one wanted to hear that they weren’t looking at one, but two separate killers, and with how it was his job to tell them that, it never made him popular; it left him hearing lots of whispers about how looking so often into killers’ heads surely had caused him to crack. Even when he wasn’t outright dismissed, there was still judgement about _how_ he got to the conclusion of a copy-cat.

The lure of no judgement was sweeter than he could resist, and words tumbled out of him without filter before he thought better of it, “Everything. It’s like he had to show me a negative so that I could see the positive. That crime scene was practically gift-wrapped.”

Unbidden, the whisper of _do you see me as I am_ crossed his thoughts. Like a veil being lifted, it came to him that Cassie Boyle on display like she had been, had served two purposes: to highlight everything the Shrike was, in opposite; and an anonymous love letter that said _you have captured my interest, I hope I can capture yours_.

He buried the thought of _that love letter was for me_ before it could surface, here, where Lecter could see it. Letting Lecter see him realize that, felt _dangerous_ , so it had to wait.

Lecter took another bite of his food before he spoke again, “The mathematics of human behavior. All those ugly variables. Some bad math with this Shrike fellow. Are you reconstructing his fantasies? What kind of problems does he have?”

If Lecter had seen his realization, he didn’t give it away, but the fact that his wording was a shade off to being outright blatant about divorcing himself from humanity, to declaring himself as Other, was – distracting. It was definitely calculated, to judge his reaction, like how a bored predator might intentionally snap a twig beneath their foot to see if their prey would run left or right.

Will narrowed his eyes slightly on Lecter’s cheek, retaliating by coiling back on his own haunches and facing the predator as he kept his answer vague, “He has a few.”

Lecter leaned forward, smiling without smiling with a mouth full of sharp teeth like a wolf amused at how the fox bared its teeth fearlessly at it, before almost winking, “Ever have any problems, Will?”

Will wanted to smash those teeth in, break them on his knuckles until they were a jagged mess just to remind Lecter that not all prey was quite so outmatched by its predator.

“No.”

They both knew it was a blatant lie, but Lecter was the wolf meeting Little Red Riding Hood in the forest for the first time, and he could play along. It didn’t mean that he didn’t play up his disappointment, like he expected better of him, “Of course you don’t.”

Even without looking, Will could feel how intent and pointed Lecter’s gaze was on him behind that disappointment, like maybe it wasn’t all fake and he’d wanted a different answer.

“You and I are just alike. Problem free. Nothing about us to feel horrible about.”

It was like he was Dorothy looking behind the Wizard’s curtain, seeing past the smoke and mirrors, at perhaps more truth of Lecter than intended being seen, beyond the blatant goad.

The _you and I are just alike_.

He gave Will a moment to react, carefully measured to another bite of food, before shifting the conversation away from the route they’d gone down, “I think Uncle Jack sees you as a fragile little tea-cup, the finest china used for only special guests.”

Will couldn’t hold in the scoff at ‘fragile’, clearly an understatement considering how blatantly Jack was acting in all but second-guessing anything Will gave him, and then again at ‘special guests’, if that was what he wanted to call the less-run-of-the-mill murderers. The annoyance of being thought fragile but again and again exposed to the things that would break even the stoutest, subject to such a dichotomy with the added bonus that even the suspicion of hairline fractures wasn’t enough to stop it, made his words biting, sharp, with the expectation that Lecter would second the protocol of saving him only for ‘special guests’ because he was ‘fragile’, “How do _you_ see me?”

Lecter just smiled, and Will couldn’t get a grasp of everything behind it.

“The mongoose I want under the house when the snakes slither by.”

Will was taken aback at the comparison, a little at a loss for the _show me your teeth little predator and we’ll compare_ that didn’t quite feel like a threat, just, maybe the _possibility_ to be one in that smile.

“Finish your breakfast, Will.”

~

Will didn’t wait for Hannibal to finish eating before he left the table, going into the bathroom to wash up a bit so that he didn’t look and feel like he’d done a bender the night before, locking the door between them. He’d like to take a shower and properly clean up but not with Hannibal in the hotel room waiting on him, which considering how fastidious the Other was with his appearance, it would bug him to be in close quarters with him _if he didn’t_.

He dabbed on a bit of cologne to hide the scent of sweat that wouldn’t wash off, but only from a distance, didn’t bother to trim his beard growth, and just ran a damp hand through his curly hair while standing there in wrinkled clothes, to complete the image. Entirely going for the unkempt look.

He saw how Lecter first inhaled, pinching his lips as he turned from where he was cleaning up their breakfast towards him, and pointedly didn’t say a thing. The pained creases at the corners of his eyes said it for him.

It was probably playing with fire, intentionally acting like this, but it was payback for the ambush. And away from home, this was as close as could be to his ‘home turf’ without being in Wolf Trap and a lot could be excused when responding to an uninvited guest into your home. Of course, Lecter would respond with ‘kill them with excessive politeness as a tactic to get them out of his space’, with a high probability of actual killing taking place considering his Other-ness, but Will preferred blatant, spiteful, rudeness. It worked for him, and maybe it would shift Lecter’s interest into the killing-sort, but maybe it could scare him off if he had to deal with him all surly and disheveled on a regular basis.

He walked right past Lecter to the door, making for the rental car he’d rented at the airport while scanning the parking lot for Lecter’s own rented car so he could shoo him off to it – but none of the other cars stood out like he expected it to.

Pausing at his car door, Lecter spoke from behind him, holding out the keys he’d forgotten inside in his rush to leave Lecter, “I took the liberty of locking up behind me, knowing you wouldn’t leave without me, without these.”

Will snorted, “You underestimate how much I currently don’t like you; I could have hotwired the car and just paid the fine for damaging the car.”

Lecter looked amused, in the sort of _but would you have_ way that made him want to next time, just to see his face when he did – but that implied a next time, and if Will had his way, there’d _be_ _no_ next time.

He narrowed his eyes at the man, “’Leave without you’ implies that you’re going with me. In the same car because I don’t see one for you.” Not entirely sure where he’d left the keys, and not entirely sure if Lecter wouldn’t have snagged them at some point while he wasn’t watching just for control of the situation.

“I thought it be prudent that we go in the same car as to continue to build our relationship. Close proximity is often best to start any relationship.” He casually opened the door to the car and got into the passenger seat before sticking the keys in the ignition and starting the car.

“Isn’t the saying ‘absence makes the heart fonder’?”

Lecter just smiled as he turned in the seat to look his way, “Fond already then, Will?”

He opened the door, “Only in your dreams, Dr. Lecter.” – putting his seatbelt on, then pulling out of the parking lot – “And doesn’t that mean you’re projecting on me your own wishes to be friendly? That’s bad psychiatry.”

“Is it? Or am I just being honest in my hope in a friendship with you despite the obligations put between us by Jack?” He eyed the road, trying to not white-knuckle the steering wheel, not responding to that like it wasn't _worth_ a response.

Even if that was the truth, and he doubted Lecter would be quite so blatant about anything he wanted, or blasé in any answer to a pointed prod, so the idea of it being the truth didn’t strike him as true, there was no benefit to Lecter in them being friends. Lecter was definitely somebody who built friendships based on worth and benefit to himself, wouldn’t foster _any_ relationship that couldn’t give him some benefit in the long-run, and he could say that he wanted him as a friend – but it was because he was _interested_ in him, as a _curiosity_.

If by some miracle Lecter _was_ being genuine – and it would be quite the miracle considering that it wasn’t in the nature for predators to befriend their food, and whatever type of Other Lecter he was, he was definitely a _predator_ looking down on humans, of which _Will_ was one – the Other was going to have to try much harder than that for him to believe him.

As such, he let the quiet settle and didn’t break it until he had parked the car at one of the addresses that he’d been given to check out, and was unbuckling his seat belt while glancing over at Lecter to tell him what he was going to be doing – to see that he was smiling, “What are you smiling about?”

Lecter had already unbuckled but just stayed in the car with him, as he had just paused with his seatbelt in his hand at the sight of that smile. Will was starting to wonder if amused was just a default state for Lecter, or it was just something that got brought up around him, but if the latter was true, well, the level of cooperation was about to _drastically_ drop.

“Peeking behind the curtain. I’m curious how the FBI goes about its business when it isn’t kicking down doors.”

Will got out of the car, resisting the urge to slam the door right in Lecter’s _face_ by a _hair_ despite how the man was still on his half of the car, if _only_ because it felt like childishly stomping his foot and whining that he _didn’t wanna!_ And he was an _adult_.

“We’re lucky that we’re not doing house-to-house interviews.” Will really hated doing those, mostly because he went in to know if they’d seen or heard something about the one case he was working and left knowing a lot more, most of which had nothing to do with why he’d been there in the first place and was information that he could do nothing with. There had been so many cases of spousal violence, child abuse, child neglect, drug abuse, and unlawful imprisonment that he’d had no legal right to interfere in, and had been forced to step aside in as a NOLA officer.

Maybe his boss should have taken him seriously when he’d said that somebody was hurting somebody else. Maybe he would have filed more of his suspicions instead of skipping right ahead into interfering in those instances on his own time after so many.

Maybe that one crime of opportunity against a perpetrator of animal cruelty would have been the only instance of violence done by him. Maybe there wouldn’t have been a body dragged deep into the bayou to never be found when one act of violence was followed by another and self-defense wouldn’t have become murder. Maybe that one body wouldn’t have been joined by others, all left for ‘gators to devour.

“We found a little piece of metal in the clothes Elise Nichols had on. A shred from a pipe threader.”

Lecter gave the smallest of pauses as he shut the door behind him, in following after him, a muted _excuse me_ in his body language, “Jack Crawford wants me to make sure you’re of sound mind and body . . to look for metal pipe-threaders?”

Will couldn’t help how his lips twisted up at that, in a not so nice way; for Hannibal imposing his company on him when it was unwanted with this insistence that he join him on what was basically a milk run, “That’s between you and Jack.”

Lecter took the not so subtle hint, letting that drop at the whole unsaid but loud _serves you right being led somewhere under false pretenses_ , “Must be hundreds of construction sites all over Minnesota.”

“Certain kinda metal. Certain kinda pipe. Certain kinda pipe coating. It means we’re looking at constructions sites that use that certain kinda metal pipe with that coating, which isn’t nearly as many as you’d think.” The list that he’d gotten to visit while the Shrike’s mindset was so close, wasn’t even ten locations, but wasn’t expected to yield much hence why the rest of Jack’s team had flown off to another case that had cropped up but Jack had considered too pedestrian for him so he had been left behind.

“And what are we looking for?”

Will shrugged faintly, “At this stage in the investigation, anything really. But mostly anything peculiar. Just possible suspects that Jack will want to check further into to see if they need to establish alibis.”

Jack didn’t seem to understand that his intuition was pretty good but when he went to check out places that weren’t declared crime scenes, the chances were better that he’d find everything but what he originally had come for.

Case in point was that counterfeiting/money laundering ring he’d stumbled across a few months back when he’d gone to change his insurance policy.

~

Will was walking into the sixth construction site of the day, and nearly sighed at the sight of the secretary fiddling around behind the counter.

He’d already had to put in a tip with the local FBI to check out one of the sites as having connections to the mob, and he was now seriously debating if he should do so again for her embezzling.

Maybe he should just tell her that if she was going to be stealing her boss’ money, she shouldn’t be wearing diamond earrings worth more than his car around the office.

He hoped Jack got unnecessarily stopped at a traffic stop and subject to a drug search after he landed in Kansas. Or suffered a mild rash because detergent didn’t get fully washed out of his clothes.

He wanted petty revenge for being here unnecessarily, when he could have been on a plane home last night grading papers and currently sleeping in a pile of his dogs. Jack could have just as easily sent him photos of the copycat’s murder scene and had local PD do this part and the whole team could have combed through the gathered data instead of just relying on him to pick somebody out of a paper line-up.

Jack didn’t even have the decency of leaving him a warrant to request any of this information if he was refused, and he was just lucky that the site with the mob connections was ran by a man with a daughter right around the other victims’ ages that had been eager to help when it came to looking at employee records for pipe-threaders.

If he worded his request like a demand and flustered the secretary, Dixie, into giving him access to her employee records, it wasn’t illegal. She could have refused to until she saw a warrant.

Even as Will started leafing through papers, Dixie went for the landline, quickly typing in a number that she only messed up twice as she threw them in turns, suspicious and wide-eyed, looks. Lecter joined him as she got through to her boss, making an effort to speak in a hushed tone but at first, she spoke too quiet and the person on the other end didn’t hear her, then when she spoke loud enough – they were only five feet away. She might have as well just spoke normally from the beginning, it was only making her look even more suspicious, and Will made a mental note to leave a tip with OHSHA to check safety regulations here.

“Two fellas from the FBI, they’re going through drawers now. Putting papers in file boxes. Yes. They’re taking things. No. They didn’t say who- Yes, they can, can’t they?” She turned fully towards them, “What did you say your names were?”

Will didn’t even turn away from what he was doing as he fished out his badge and held it up for her to see, continuing to flip through papers before one caught his attention, “Garret Jacob Hobbs.”

It was nothing so obvious as blood splatters or a _you are here_ sign but it didn’t look like all the others. It stood out with its _lack_ of something.

“One of our pipe threaders. Those are all the resignation letters. Plumbers union requires them whenever members finish a job.” Dixie turned back to the phone as a burst of noise came from it, having apparently forgotten she was still on the phone, “I’ll call you back.”

Then she came back around the desk, making to put herself right in the middle of what they were doing.

The lack of address wasn’t a lot, but it was the sort of thing that someone who wanted to make it harder to find them but not go completely off the grid did. He’d done it once or twice back in his twenties when he’d been seriously considering just ditching society all together and going to live self-sufficient in the Louisiana swamps. Did it all the way up to when he’d moved up to Wolf Trap, considering NOLA had believed his line about no real postal address out in the boonies he’d lived in – and it had been true – but it had also allowed him to get away with leaving a postal box as the only address in his file.

Alana had once asked him why he’d done that, and he’d said something about making it harder for people like Jehovah’s Witnesses to show up on his doorstep – which had been true – but he’d liked the knowledge that it had been very hard for _anyone_ to show up unannounced to his home more.

It was definitely something that the Shrike would do too, but it was nothing without another piece of information, “Did Mr. Hobbs have a daughter?”

Which was – of course, damn you to hole-y socks Jack – when Dixie started to get cage-y, “Might have.”

“Eighteen or nineteen, wind-chaffed? Plain but pretty? She would have auburn hair.” Before making a rough gesture about a head shorter than him, “About this tall.”

Dixie shrugged, hands fluttering around, “Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t keep company with these people.” It took seconds for him to put together that she was embezzling because she thought she was better than she was, and she wanted things that would prove that she was as good as she thought she was, and he could _use_ that.

If Hobbs was the Shrike, and considering how much he loved his daughter to the point that he killed surrogates so he didn’t kill her with how upset he was at how she was leaving home, there was no way he didn’t regularly talk about her like she was the very best daughter anyone could have. He was proud of his daughter, probably carried photos of his family – of her – around everywhere he went, and showed them off at the slightest opportunity.

It was possible that Hobbs’ daughter had even visited him at work.

It would be a bit unethical, but considering her rudeness so far, committing to a simple yes or no of whether the description matched for a possible daughter that Hobbs’ had, was the least that she could do-

Lecter moved closer, crossing into his personal space and making something deep within him coil and still at the predator at his back, “What is it about Garret Jacob Hobbs that you find so peculiar?”

His words were stilted, sounded faint to even his own ears as he realized that he’d taken on somebody else for a moment without realizing it, “Left a phone number. No address.”

Lecter looked amused then, and he had the sense that it was about _who’d_ he’d taken on for that moment, and he narrowed his eyes in warning – he’d take whatever reprimand he’d get from Jack for leaving Lecter high and dry by ditching him here, if he didn’t stop being amused _at him_.

“Therefore, he has something to hide?”

Will shrugged, not eager to explain his hunch and why he thought it had credence, “Everyone else left an address.” – then looked towards Dixie, eyes drifting down to her cheek – “You have an address for Mr. Hobbs?”

~

Dixie had found an address for Garret Jacob Hobbs while Will had gone back to browsing any other files for someone of particular interest, but no one else had stuck out. Just like the previous sites, he’d been loading up paperwork on pipe-threaders into boxes that he’d put in the truck for Jack’s team to go over for something his cursory look-over might have missed. Eventually, all of it was in boxes and the three of them were loading it into the car when one of the boxes fell over and papers scattered everywhere.

“I got it.”

Dixie was next to him, helping once her box was put safely down.

Will distantly noticed that Lecter wasn’t right next to them, but only in the way that the absence of something is noticed without knowing what is missing and not enough to make him lift his head to properly look.

Not right away.

When he looked up some, out of the corner of his eye he could see Lecter watching them holding up a phone near his face.

For just a second he caught his gaze, and the Other smiled with the hint of sharp teeth. The perfect picture of the Wolf inviting Little Red Riding Hood into Grandmother’s.

Then he walked back out, picking up a paper that had made it all the way to the door like nothing had just happened, “I think this is the last of it.”

~

Will parked across the street from a cozy, well-kept tract home in Bloomington, well aware that Jack would be against this little unofficial visit but he wanted to see Garret Jacob Hobbs for himself while he was in Minnesota.

Also, Lecter had done something in the office that they’d last gone to, so he’d set aside the last location for the moment with the ready-made excuse that they were further away than he’d wanted to go without a break, and decided to make a little house-call during that ‘break’ since he was ‘in the area’.

Dealing with Lecter was giving him a headache, so he popped open his mostly empty aspirin bottle and dry-swallowed one with ease before climbing out of the car as Lecter unbuckled his seatbelt. Still seeing how the Other smiled with a touch of excitement out of the corner of his eye.

Will’s lip curled without input, having _had_ _it_ with Lecter’s continued persistence in being _amused_ at him.

If Lecter saw a mongoose in him, he’d _show_ him a mongoose. Show him what happened to snakes that came too close.

He turned on his heel and got right up in Lecter’s face, glaring at his nose with teeth flashing, “Don’t.”

There was half a second where Lecter almost looked surprised before a pleased little smile crossed his face – and that was _not_ the appropriate response. He shouldn’t be happy or proud; he should be annoyed or upset or _taking the damn blatant hint_.

He didn’t know how to respond to that, reacting further wasn’t going to scare off the Other, actually just seemed to do nothing more than increasing his _interest_.

Will stepped back warily, reassessing for a better angle to get his point across, when the door to the Hobbs house abruptly opened and a woman, bleeding and wheezing, was shoved down the porch steps in a heap before the door was slammed shut behind her. He didn’t hesitate to run forward to her, taking in the multiple puncture wounds to her torso and arms, and trying to press his hands to the worst ones to stem blood flow. She was already terribly pale, with the shade of crimson blood that said fatal wound spilling out of her chest and staining her shirt entirely; his hands quickly were red as well.

Haltingly, she reached out to Will, clutching at his wrist and streaking him with more blood, before she began to spasm. Her heartbeat slowed beneath his fingers despite his efforts, her breathing wet and gasping, but her eyes are intent on his, refusing to let him look away as she tried to pull him closer so he could hear her, “Ab-gail. Go.”

They both knew she was already dead, and she let go as he nods faintly.

Will doesn’t even bother trying for the handle, going forward with speed and hardly slowing as he threw himself at the door.

A sickening crack followed as he pulled back enough to rear back for a well-placed kick to the side of the door knob, rolling his aching shoulder as he prowled forward past the splintered door frame and broken door.

He forgets for a moment about the monster at his back watching as he makes his way room by room, gun out and safety off, ignoring the splatters of blood defacing the walls and floors from where Hobbs had stabbed then dragged his wife outside. Not seeing how Lecter follows on silent feet at a casual pace, barely looking at the dead Mrs. Hobbs while he stepped over her as his gaze hardly strays from Will, only to stop in the broken doorway.

“Garret Jacob Hobbs? F.B.I.”

Will stops cold in the doorway into the kitchen at the sight of a man in his forties with wild eyes standing behind his daughter with a knife to her throat.

Her eyes are wide and surprised even as she tucks her chin against where he holds her still with one hand at her jaw, breathe ragged. He sees how it is only her upper arms that are restrained in his grip, and can see in the moment of eye contact he makes with her how beyond her surprise, she itches for the chance to tear herself free, frustrated, as her gaze flicks to the knives in the block on the counter he realizes that she’d been going for when her mother had been stabbed and had nearly gotten to before she’d been pinned.

Then his gaze drifts back to Hobbs fully, and _sees_ and _knows_ that he isn’t looking at a mere man anymore, but not a Other either. He realizes that the cannibalism had reasons, two-fold, the second of which was evident in Hobbs’ eyes now; he’d been chasing the rumors of a man becoming Other, in the stories of the wendigo.

His gaze is bloody and dark. A monster peeling back its human skin as it is rises back on cloven hooves, teeth bloody and sharp.

It’s still nothing compared to the monster he glimpsed peeking out from Lecter’s eyes back in Jack’s office when he’d dared to peer into the bloody abyss.

Will doesn’t hesitate to fire at his exposed upper chest when Hobbs moves the knife in his hand across his daughter’s throat, one after another.

BAM. BAM. BAM.

Hobbs doesn’t go down, and Will hopes that stories of fire as the only way to kill a wendigo aren’t true; Hobbs’ knife hardly wavers and Will keeps shooting.

BAM. BAM.

Then Hobbs gasps wetly and starts to fall, knife pulling back as it escapes weak hands.

Will is moving and kicks the knife away, holstering his gun to kneel next to the bleeding girl in seconds, hardly registering that Lecter had followed him in as he applies pressure to her wounds.

He doesn’t look up from his frantic efforts at the hissing sound of jagged wet breathes from Hobbs, “See? See?”

( _do you see what I’ve made here_ )

He hardly hears it, hardly can feel the blood spilling past his fingers, the ebbing warmth, his eyes glazing over.

Suddenly Lecter is kneeling next to him, hands folding over his to address her wound.

Will, as if from a distance, tracks her gaze to her dying father, and frees one hand to gently raise her head so her glassy eyes meet his as Lecter works.

He doesn’t look away as she focuses on him.

 _“See? See?”_ echoes in a silence only broken by Abigail desperately wheezing through her slashed wind-pipe.

~

Will is blood-splattered and maybe a bit in shock as he leans against his rental car, reflective light flashing across his blood-speckled glasses.

Everything is dulled in his head, even as the circus of ambulances, paramedics, police cars and officers go at full volume and with flashing lights around him, all he can hear is the pounding of his heart and see the blood on his hands.

His head lifts as paramedics haul Abigail into the back of their ambulance, Lecter keeping pace as he holds her hand, before crawling in beside her as the door shuts behind them.

He then stays only as long as he is needed, giving a statement, letting them take his blood-soaked clothes in return for ill-fitting BPD sweats and shirt, after standing still so they could take pictures of how the blood covered him. Then he flees the scene, knowing that he should call Jack and tell him what had happened but he can’t do that right now, so he doesn’t.

He doesn’t remember much about the drive from points a to b.

It’s not until he’s sitting in the parking lot of his hotel that he realizes that Lecter’s things are still in the car, and the thought _it would be rude to not return them_ crosses his mind.

His head drops to the steering wheel, as he knows that while it could have been an accident and it likely had been considering it was unlikely Lecter had _planned_ to be riding away in an ambulance separate from him – but there’s this nagging suspicion of _who had Lecter called_ and he doesn’t dismiss the possibility that he had, even if there will be no way to prove either thing – Lecter would take full advantage of the accident. Either Will would need to return it on his own, or- he could hold onto it just to see how long it took Lecter to ask for it back.

Conveniently ‘forgetting’ the things in the car when he returned would go too far though, and likely cross the line for the amount of purposeful rudeness Lecter would tolerate from him, so he grabbed the items, and went back into the hotel room.

~

When he gets back to Maryland, he firmly stashes Lecter’s things in a cabinet in his kitchen, and does his best to forget he has them as he pays attention to how Jack has Abigail transferred out of Minnesota, for her safety, to bring her to Baltimore.

Where he could have easy access to her. ‘For her safety’ isn’t even a false claim, considering that while it does hit the news that the Minnesota Shrike was killed in a shoot-out with the FBI, Hobbs’ name is kept out for the moment so that she isn’t overran with the families of her father’s victims all looking for answers and/or retribution, it _will_ come out at some point. Jack has her moved to Maryland though because he doesn’t know if she is an innocent bystander of her father’s crimes, a material witness to giving closure to the victims’ families in possible locations of the remains of their dead, or a suspected accomplice.

Will knows that Jack will want his opinion on that.

He also is going to put that off as long as possible, because he doesn’t know – maybe doesn’t _want_ to know, he won’t deny that to himself – but he’ll take whatever reprieve he can get before Jack corners him for answers.

Even if that means grabbing the papers that he hadn’t finished grading, stuffing them in his bag, then calling Alana on the way to the hospital and asking her to fill in on his classes for the day as a favor. Knowing that she’ll fill in the pieces of why he wasn’t coming in and where he’d be going instead, and hearing the steel behind her agreement that said she would gladly stonewall Jack when he came looking.

When he gets to Abigail’s hospital room, and sees her integrated into an elaborate weave of life-support machines, he freezes.

Hobbs’ voice whispers in his ear at the sight, proud, “ _See? See?_ ”

( _do you_ ** _see_** _what I’ve made?_ )

His wife clutches at his wrist, gasping out pained, desperate, “ _Ab-gail_.”

( _save her_ )

Abigail herself stares him down with a hunter’s gaze, pinning him in place, saying nothing at all.

( _I’m not prey and won’t die like it_ )

His gaze drifts off her after a long moment, to fall on how sleeping next to her in a chair, is Dr. Hannibal Lecter. It moves from how a pristine suit with its subtle plaid pattern in dark greys and perfect tie with its crimson floral patterns, was slightly disheveled and crumbled, tie almost loose around his neck, to how he is holding Abigail’s hand.

Offering a tiny comfort.

A part of him wants to take her other hand, complete the picture of the two who saved her life, of a-

But it’s not his place. He killed her father.

Instead he works on his grading in the chair next to Lecter, all while looking at that unconscious care.

A part of him thinks that if he wanted to end the Other, end his _interest_ once and for all, this would be the perfect time. He slept unknowing of his presence. It would take just a moment to break his neck. A moment to stab his pen into his throat. A moment to press it up under one of Lecter’s arms. A moment to smother him with one of Abigail’s pillows.

A million ways flashed through his head about how he could take this moment of vulnerability and _use_ it.

Lecter might even approve of the one that has him tilting his head back and taking his teeth to Lecter’s throat and crushing his windpipe if he couldn’t tear it out, would even as he bled out be proud in the moments before he made sure to take him down with him, with his much sharper teeth piercing his skin much easier.

He doubted that Lecter was that deeply asleep though, was probably acting so right now because even if he wasn’t considered a true _threat_ , Lecter was far too much of a predator to let someone that close to his underbelly without being fully aware at the time. Had probably even woke up the moment he’d come into the room.

He could still take his chances, see who could strike fastest, hardest quickest.

All he did, in the end though, was stare.

**Author's Note:**

> Me: What are you doing. You have at least six posted WIPs, you shouldn't be doing another, there's already something like ten WIPs on your laptop-  
> Also me: Inspired by TheSilverQueen's Hannigram work: I need to do something with Hannibal. Need to. You can't stop me!  
> Me, realizing that I'm going to go ahead and write it: Don't you have Hannigram prompts you saved from Hannigram Ever After that you weren't ready for. The first one is Little Red Riding Hood-  
> Also me: *Already started*


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